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Warmachine: List-Building Ramble

I love playing Warmachine, but when it comes to collecting, I’m several expansions and dozens of models behind. It occurred to me the other day that I essentially stopped collecting around Superiority. I don’t own cavalry, plastic ‘jacks, Harkevich, or the upgrade kits. I don’t even own a Behemoth. Let’s face it, miniatures are expensive. I don’t often buy miniatures simply because I can’t afford to. I’ve made some lucky trades, which is how I acquired the battlegroup up there – the result of trading a bunch of old Warhammer bitz and figures and two Magic the Gathering dual lands. I think the last miniature I actually bought was Zerkova, sometime last fall.

From that standpoint, when it comes to building lists(and playing games in general) I mostly just try to have fun. I use the models I like, and if they’re not the most broken ones out there, that’s ok. Khador is a great infantry faction, but even there I’m a bit lacking. I have the Winterguard deathstar, with a single rocketeer. I have minimum Iron Fangs plus UA. I own the Great Bears(got them a few years ago at 50% off). I own a full unit of Demo Corps. But no Kayazy, no Rifle Corps, no Nyss Hunters, no Shocktroopers…. A list for me often does comes down to just a few choices, and many of them look similar. Eventually I’ll expand what I have, but for now I’m mostly ok. I haven’t even played a game in ages, because I don’t like going to the LGS when I can’t afford anything. I feel that if you’re getting to hang out in a game store and play Warmachine for 5 hours you should at least buy a solo or a few cups of coffee or whatever. (Our LGS has a cafe and does coffee, sandwiches, etc. It rocks.) So rather than freeloading, I’d rather stay home and paint some of the bare metal I still have laying around.

Back to lists, though – I play what I like, and that’s totally cool. I can’t wait to play Karchev some more, even if I don’t have any mechanics as support. I like playing the Butchers, because they kill stuff dead. The Old Witch can be ridiculously mean, and even Zerkova has her tricks. For me, it really is true that switching warcasters changes the entire game. I’m glad I have that option, and that I own a variety of casters that I can use. Khador is a really fun faction, and thankfully my LGS isn’t saturated with Khador players like I know some places are. We have a pretty mix of factions, from what I remember, and a number of good Hordes players as well. I’m not a hugely competitive player, so I do lose a lot. Again, that’s ok because I know eventually, once I can get more games in, I’ll become a better player. And even when I do lose, I still have fun. My favorite games are the close ones, where it comes down to just a few models left on the board on each side, and it’s literally one die roll that determines the win. Those are the best.

I think my whole point here(and I did say that it was a ramble) is that for me personally, list-building is often about how much I have in the game, and not necessarily about how many über models I can fit in there. That’s not to say that I don’t use competitive units, but I also won’t handicap myself deliberately by taking sub-par units. It’s different for each person. I don’t take too much time when I make lists – again, limited selection – and I include stuff that I like seeing on the tabletop. A few fun games last year came down to a Devastator with Rage tokens from eButcher trying to pull off a caster kill(didn’t work). It’s stuff like that that I really enjoy.

Lastly, on miniatures and transporting them: my homemade carrying case is falling apart, and I could really use a new transport. I’m looking at Portable Warfare, because they’re the only company so far that I’ve seen making a bright orange transport bag. You won’t ever misplace that sucker. It’s bright freaking orange. So I’m trying to save up for that, and I’ve started a ChipIn for it. It’s a little fundraiser thing, where people can donate. You can find it here. I’ve got an Etsy shop where I sell dice bags and such, and you can use the coupon code THNXMUCH for 15% off your order. I’d much prefer to sell a few dice bags, so please spread the word, and pass the coupon code along too!